towards religion was, to a certain extent, obliterated by the education which William received, and which was of a nature to dispose him to be both a materialist and a free-thinker.  He may be said in fact to have been brought up in an atmosphere of Renan-ism and Strauss-ism, for which his extraordinary and mercilessly clever mother, Empress Frederick, was largely responsible, and at the moment of his marriage it looked as if he were destined to figure in history as quite as much of a philosopher, and even atheist, as Frederick the Great, for whom he professed the most profound veneration.

It was Countess Waldersee who revived all the inherited and latent religious tendencies of his character.

Up to the time when he ascended the throne, Prince William and his consort were constant and devout attendants at the prayer-meetings held in the salons of the countess, and if he remains to this day a remarkably religious man, with a sufficient regard for scriptural commands to have shown himself a more faithful husband than any other prince of his house, either living or dead—­if, to-day, piety is fashionable at the court of Berlin instead of being bad form, if the building or endowment of a church, or of a charitable institution, is regarded as the surest road to imperial favor, it is due to the influence of William’s American aunt, the daughter of that New York grocer, the first Princess Noer, and who is to-day Countess of Waldersee.

It is natural that the influence exercised over William and his wife by the countess should have given rise to the utmost jealousy, especially on the part of his mother, Empress Frederick, and during the hundred days’ reign of her lamented husband, she availed herself of her brief spell of power to secure the virtual banishment of the count and the countess from Berlin, by causing the field marshal to be transferred from the chieftaincy of the headquarter staff to the command of the army stationed in Altona.  Moreover, she did not hesitate to denounce the influence of the Waldersees as disastrous, as illiberal, and in every sense of the word reactionary, and if her husband, Emperor Frederick, was led to share her views concerning them, it was because of his disapproval of the movement against the Jews in which the countess had figured so conspicuously.  It is a peculiar fact that although Emperor William has always remained on the most affectionate terms with the Waldersees, and never loses any opportunity of manifesting the warmth of his affection for them, he has never repealed the decree of banishment to which they were virtually subjected during his father’s reign.  He has transferred the field marshal from one post to another, but he has never appointed him to one which would admit of his coming back to live in Berlin.  I cannot help thinking that the emperor resented the imputation that he was subject to the sway of his wife’s aunt, and was offended by the articles which appeared at one moment both in the German and foreign press intimating that she was the power behind the throne.  He is sufficiently jealous of his dignity to object to be considered as subject to the influence of anyone, be it man or woman, and one of the chief causes of the dismissal of old Prince Bismarck was precisely because so long as he remained in office there was a disposition to regard the kaiser as a mere puppet in the hands of the old statesman.